The band shared their first new material in the shape of a new track, Gone Home. Gone Home is The SpookSchool at their most poppy and jangling, bringing to mind the work of Veronica Falls or Allo Darlin’.
The track also comes with an excellent video, with the basic premise of a running race, with a villainous twist that will see you never look at Anna the same way again. Taken from the Continental Drift EP out 26th August 2016 on Fortuna POP! (UK) and Slumberland Records (US) and also featuring Tigercats, Wildhoney and Mercury Girls.
The Spook School are a four piece indie-pop band from Edinburgh, Scotland.
‘…AND LO! THE BIRD IS ON THE WING’ is the new album from the acclaimed Scottish songwriter, Blue Rose Code (Ross Wilson). Previewed to a sold out theatre at 2016’s Celtic Connections and released on 4th March, supported by a UK and European tour.
Recorded at Gran’s House Studio in the Scottish Borders and written between the Shetland Isles and rural Dorset, ‘…AND LO! THE BIRD IS ON THE WING’ features the finest Scottish Jazz and Folk musicians, Nashville Gospel singers, The McCrary Sisters, British music legend Danny Thompson and Hollywood A-lister, none other than Ewan McGregor.
Of the new record, Wilson says, “It’s an album for music fans and musicians, a challenging record.
“I’m passionate about that fusion of folk and jazz and where it intersects with songwriting. Working with these musicians has been a game-changer. I may have cut my throat because there’s not really a single on here but, this is the album that I’ve written and it’s just as I wished it to be.”
In the space of only a short few years and two stellar albums, Blue Rose Code, Edinburgh-born Ross Wilson, has gone from song-writing in the obscurity of an East London flat to being celebrated by the industry and fans alike as a legacy artist whose work stands alone. As BBC Radio 3 broadcaster Mary-Anne Kennedy said recently, “Blue Rose Code is one of those rare artists whose work makes you sit up and listen”.
The Ballads Of Peckham Rye, Blue Rose Code’s second record, was nominated for the prestigious Scottish Album Of The Year Awards in 2014 and featured a roll-call of remarkable talent, including Danny Thompson, Karine Polwart, John Wetton, Aidan O’Rourke and Kathryn Williams.
‘GRATEFUL’, the first single from the new album was released at the end of 2015 and was playlisted on BBC Radio Scotland for a full five weeks. Truly remarkable for an act without the backing of a label or a heavy management deal.
Further praise has come from the most unexpected of quarters in Hollywood A-lister, Ewan McGregor. Ewan explained, “My uncle Denis Lawson, (star of Local Hero) gave me a copy of The Ballads Of Peckham Rye, it’s beautiful and I can’t stop listening to it.”
Performing live he is stunning, and this reputation led Edith Bowman to personally ask Ross to perform on the launch show of BBC At The Quay with Texas and Stornoway. Edith described Ross’ performance with a nine-piece band, including guest Karine Polwart, as “truly special and beautiful”.
More post punk influences albeit in a slightly more conventional package, The Cathode Ray’s second album is a triumph. Jeremy Thoms manages to marry his knack for memorable melodies with exciting guitar music to create an album which thrills from start to finish.
Jeremy Thoms: Lead Vocals/Guitar/Keys, Steve Fraser: Lead Guitar/Backing Vocals, Neil Baldwin: Bass, David Mack: Drums & Percussion
Edinburgh quartet the Spook School take their name from another group of four, a late 19th Century sect of the Glasgow School of Art who were given the nickname afterthe critically unpopular ghostly figures in their work. Later, their style helped inspire Art Nouveau, and thus the underdogs became the influencers. It is an appropriate title for a theatrical indie pop band that embraces life’s misinterpretations and messiness, and their message has never been more apparent than on their sophomore record Try to Be Hopeful the tracks are killers but lyrically August 17th & Everybody Needs To Be In Love feel like they were written for me! Speak When You’re Spoken To is an awesome song; really powerful! I bought the album only for Burn Masculinity and Binary. Because those are the only ones open to free streaming I expected the other songs to be average or sub-par. That was not the case. Speak When Spoken is easily my favourite song in the album, and it’s currently my favourite song that I listen to. It’s really powerful. track .Buy this album!
Although it was still a defining theme on their 2013 debut, Dress Up, Try to Be Hopeful finds the group writing much more explicitly about queerness and identity. As singer and guitarist Nye Todd explained in an interview, “A lot of the lyrics I wrote on our first record were about coming to terms with being trans, whereas on this one the songs are more about a feeling of ‘Yeah, this is an identity! This is GOOD!”
Edinburgh quartet The Spook School’s second album, Try To Be Hopeful, was probably one of the most triumphant albums of 2015. The album was recorded whilst guitarist Nye Todd was going through testosterone therapy, a crucial step in him embracing his trans-identity. It was a huge event in his life, and as such it in many ways shaped the formation of the albums own identity. It was an album of noisy, triumphant and tuneful pop-songs, that explored the topics of sexuality, identity, and most of all embracing the spirit of being yourself, no matter who that is.
Burn Masculinity was about still having to challenge the casually sexist world of “lads” even though you were now, gender-speaking, one of them and Binary questioned why the world try’s to place us into their hexadecimal, black and white world of gender. Although it wasn’t all serious gender politics, I Want To Kiss You was about wanting to kiss people (obviously). It managed to tred the difficult line of tackling important issues, but with enough humour, attitude and hooks to make it just as enjoyable as it was important.
Blue Rose Code and an incredible song taken from the new album THE BALLAD OF PECKHAM RYE Ross Wilson and his band are currently touring around the UK try to catch this tour,
Im so glad there is something new from the Edinburgh band BROKEN RECORDS, the EP “Toska” the raw power of this band featuring Jamie Sutherlands Vocals in one of Scotland’s finest bands, songs rooted in the folk tradition with accomplished playing featuring piano, strings and percussion.
The Fat Angel Sings 